MAIL(1) GENIX Programmer's Manual MAIL(1)
NAME
mail - send and receive mail
SYNOPSIS
mail [ -f [ name ] ] [ people ... ]
INTRODUCTION
Mail is a intelligent mail processing system, which has a command
syntax reminiscent of ed with lines replaced by messages.
Sending mail. To send a message to one or more other people, mail
can be invoked with arguments which are the names of people to send
to. You are then expected to type in your message, followed by an
EOT (control-D) at the beginning of a line. The section below,
labeled Replying to or originating mail, describes some features of
mail available to help you compose your letter.
Reading mail. In normal usage, mail is given no arguments and
checks your mail out of the post office, then printing out a one
line header of each message there. The current message is initially
the first message (numbered 1) and can be printed using the print
command (which can be abbreviated p). You can move among the mes-
sages much as you move between lines in ed, with the commands `+'
and `-' moving backwards and forwards, and simple numbers typing the
addressed message.
Disposing of mail. After examining a message you can delete (d) the
message or reply (r) to it. Deletion causes the mail program to
forget about the message. This is not irreversible, the message can
be undeleted (u) by giving its number, or the mail session can be
aborted by giving the exit (x) command. Deleted messages will, how-
ever, usually disappear never to be seen again.
Specifying messages. Commands such as print and delete often can be
given a list of message numbers as argument to apply to a number of
messages at once. Thus ``delete 1 2'' deletes messages 1 and 2,
while ``delete 1-5'' deletes messages 1 through 5. The special name
``*'' addresses all messages, and ``$'' addresses the last message;
thus the command top which prints the first few lines of a message
could be used in ``top *'' to print the first few lines of all mes-
sages.
Replying to or originating mail. You can use the reply command to
set up a response to a message, sending it back to the person who it
was from. Text you then type in, up to an end-of-file (or a line
consisting only of a ``.'') defines the contents of the message.
While you are composing a message, mail treats lines beginning with
the character `~' specially. For instance, typing ``~m'' (alone on
a line) will place a copy of the current message into the response
right shifting it by a tabstop. Other escapes will set up subject
fields, add and delete recipients to the message and allow you to
escape to an editor to revise the message or to a shell to run some
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commands. (These options will be given in the summary below.)
Ending a mail processing session. You can end a mail session with
the quit (q) command. Messages which have been examined go to your
mbox file unless they have been deleted in which case they are dis-
carded. Unexamined messages go back to the post office. The -f
option causes mail to read in the contents of your mbox (or the
specified file) for processing; when you quit mail writes undeleted
messages back to this file.
Personal and systemwide distribution lists. It is also possible to
create a personal distribution lists so that, for instance, you can
send mail to ``cohorts'' and have it go to a group of people. Such
lists can be defined by placing a line like
alias cohorts bill ozalp sklower jkf mark cory:kridle
in the file .mailrc in your home directory. The current list of
such aliases can be displayed by the alias (a) command in mail. Sys-
tem wide distribution lists can be created by editing
/usr/lib/aliases, see aliases(5) and delivermail(8); these are kept
in a slightly different syntax. In mail you send, personal aliases
will be expanded in mail sent to others so that they will be able to
reply to the recipients. System wide aliases are not expanded when
the mail is sent, but any reply returned to the machine will have
the system wide alias expanded as all mail goes through delivermail.
If you edit /usr/lib/aliases, you must run the program
newaliases(1).
Network mail (ARPA, UUCP, Berknet) Mail to sites on the ARPA net-
work and sites within Bell laboratories can be sent using
``name@site'' for ARPA-net sites or ``machine!user'' for Bell labs
sites, provided appropriate gateways are known to the system. (Be
sure to escape the ! in Bell sites when giving it on a csh command
line by preceding it with an \. Machines on an instance of the
Berkeley network are addressed as ``machine:user'', e.g.
``csvax:bill''. When addressed from the arpa-net, ``csvax:bill'' is
known as ``csvax.bill@berkeley''.
Mail has a number of options which can be set in the .mailrc file to
alter its behavior; thus ``set askcc'' enables the ``askcc''
feature. (These options are summarized below.)
SUMMARY
(Adapted from the `Mail Reference Manual') Each command is typed on
a line by itself, and may take arguments following the command word.
The command need not be typed in its entirety - the first command
which matches the typed prefix is used. For the commands which take
message lists as arguments, if no message list is given, then the
next message forward which satisfies the command's requirements is
used. If there are no messages forward of the current message, the
search proceeds backwards, and if there are no good messages at all,
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mail types ``No applicable messages'' and aborts the command.
- Goes to the previous message and prints it out. If
given a numeric argument n , goes to the n th previous
message and prints it.
? Prints a brief summary of commands.
! Executes the UNIX shell command which follows.
alias (a) With no arguments, prints out all currently-defined
aliases. With one argument, prints out that alias.
With more than one argument, adds the users named in the
second and later arguments to the alias named in the
first argument.
chdir (c) Changes the user's working directory to that speci-
fied, if given. If no directory is given, then changes
to the user's login directory.
delete (d) Takes a list of messages as argument and marks them
all as deleted. Deleted messages will not be saved in
mbox , nor will they be available for most other com-
mands.
dp (also dt) Deletes the current message and prints the
next message. If there is no next message, mail says
``at EOF.''
edit (e) Takes a list of messages and points the text editor
at each one in turn. On return from the editor, the
message is read back in.
exit (ex or x) Effects an immediate return to the Shell
without modifying the user's system mailbox, his mbox
file, or his edit file in -f .
from (f) Takes a list of messages and prints their message
headers.
headers (h) Lists the current range of headers, which is an 18
message group. If a ``+'' argument is given, then the
next 18 message group is printed, and if a ``-'' argu-
ment is given, the previous 18 message group is printed.
help A synonym for ?
hold (ho, also preserve) Takes a message list and marks each
message therein to be saved in the user's system mailbox
instead of in mbox. Does not override the delete com-
mand.
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mail (m) Takes as argument login names and distribution group
names and sends mail to those people.
next (n like + or CR) Goes to the next message in sequence
and types it. With an argument list, types the next
matching message.
preserve A synonym for hold.
print (p) Takes a message list and types out each message on
the user's terminal.
quit (q) Terminates the session, saving all undeleted,
unsaved messages in the user's mbox file in his login
directory, preserving all messages marked with hold or
preserve or never referenced in his system mailbox, and
removing all other messages from his system mailbox. If
new mail has arrived during the session, the message
``You have new mail'' is given. If given while editing
a mailbox file with the -f flag, then the edit file is
rewritten. A return to the Shell is effected, unless
the rewrite of edit file fails, in which case the user
can escape with the exit command.
reply (r) Takes a message list and sends mail to each message
author just like the mail command. The default message
must not be deleted.
respond A synonym for reply .
save (s) Takes a message list and a filename and appends each
message in turn to the end of the file. The filename in
quotes, followed by the line count and character count
is echoed on the user's terminal.
set (se) With no arguments, prints all variable values.
Otherwise, sets option. Arguments are of the form
``option=value'' or ``option.''
shell (sh) Invokes an interactive version of the shell.
size Takes a message list and prints out the size in charac-
ters of each message.
top Takes a message list and prints the top few lines of
each. The number of lines printed is controlled by the
variable toplines and defaults to five.
type (t) A synonym for print .
unalias Takes a list of names defined by alias commands and dis-
cards the remembered groups of users. The group names
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no longer have any significance.
undelete (u) Takes a message list and marks each one as not being
deleted.
unset Takes a list of option names and discards their remem-
bered values; the inverse of set .
visual (v) Takes a message list and invokes the display editor
on each message.
write (w) A synonym for save .
xit (x) A synonym for exit .
Here is a summary of the tilde escapes, which are used when compos-
ing messages to perform special functions. Tilde escapes are only
recognized at the beginning of lines. The name ``tilde escape'' is
somewhat of a misnomer since the actual escape character can be set
by the option escape.
~!command Execute the indicated shell command, then return to the
message.
~c name ... Add the given names to the list of carbon copy reci-
pients.
~d Read the file ``dead.letter'' from your home directory
into the message.
~e Invoke the text editor on the message collected so far.
After the editing session is finished, you may continue
appending text to the message.
~h Edit the message header fields by typing each one in
turn and allowing the user to append text to the end or
modify the field by using the current terminal erase and
kill characters.
~m messages Read the named messages into the message being sent,
shifted right one tab. If no messages are specified,
read the current message.
~p Print out the message collected so far, prefaced by the
message header fields.
~q Abort the message being sent, copying the message to
``dead.letter'' in your home directory if save is set.
~r filename Read the named file into the message.
~s string Cause the named string to become the current subject
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field.
~t name ... Add the given names to the direct recipient list.
~v Invoke an alternate editor (defined by the VISUAL
option) on the message collected so far. Usually, the
alternate editor will be a screen editor. After you
quit the editor, you may resume appending text to the
end of your message.
~w filename Write the message onto the named file.
~|command Pipe the message through the command as a filter. If
the command gives no output or terminates abnormally,
retain the original text of the message. The command
fmt(1) is often used as command to rejustify the mes-
sage.
~~string Insert the string of text in the message prefaced by a
single ~. If you have changed the escape character,
then you should double that character in order to send
it.
Options are controlled via the set and unset commands. Options may
be either binary, in which case it is only significant to see
whether they are set or not, or string, in which case the actual
value is of interest. The binary options include the following:
append Causes messages saved in mbox to be appended to the
end rather than prepended. (This is set in
/usr/lib/Mail.rc on version 7 systems.)
ask Causes mail to prompt you for the subject of each
message you send. If you respond with simply a new-
line, no subject field will be sent.
askcc Causes you to be prompted for additional carbon copy
recipients at the end of each message. Responding
with a newline indicates your satisfaction with the
current list.
autoprint Causes the delete command to behave like dp - thus,
after deleting a message, the next one will be typed
automatically.
ignore Causes interrupt signals from your terminal to be
ignored and echoed as @'s.
metoo Usually, when a group is expanded that contains the
sender, the sender is removed from the expansion.
Setting this option causes the sender to be included
in the group.
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quiet Suppresses the printing of the version when first
invoked.
save Causes the message collected prior to a interrupt to
be saved on the file ``dead.letter'' in your home
directory on receipt of two interrupts (or after a
~q.)
The following options have string values:
EDITOR Pathname of the text editor to use in the edit com-
mand and ~e escape. If not defined, then a default
editor is used.
SHELL Pathname of the shell to use in the ! command and the
~! escape. A default shell is used if this option is
not defined.
VISUAL Pathname of the text editor to use in the visual com-
mand and ~v escape.
escape If defined, the first character of this option gives
the character to use in the place of ~ to denote
escapes.
record If defined, gives the pathname of the file used to
record all outgoing mail. If not defined, then out-
going mail is not so saved.
toplines If defined, gives the number of lines of a message to
be printed out with the top command; normally, the
first five lines are printed.
FILES
/usr/spool/mail/* post office
~/mbox your old mail
~/.mailrc file giving initial mail commands
/tmp/R# temporary for editor escape
/usr/lib/Mail.help* help files
/usr/lib/Mail.rc system initialization file
/bin/mail to do actual mailing
/etc/delivermail postman
SEE ALSO
binmail(1), fmt(1), newaliases(1), aliases(5), delivermail(8)
`The Mail Reference Manual'
AUTHOR
Kurt Shoens
BUGS
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